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<title>'til we can't tell where you end and where i begin by sanj_sanj</title>
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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26206465">'til we can't tell where you end and where i begin</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/sanj_sanj/pseuds/sanj_sanj'>sanj_sanj</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Miraculous Ladybug</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Aged-Up Character(s), Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, Hurt/Comfort, Jealous Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir, Making Up, Post-Hawk Moth Defeat, Post-Reveal Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir/Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug, Roommates</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-31</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 08:07:23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,463</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26206465</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/sanj_sanj/pseuds/sanj_sanj</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>After Hawkmoth's defeat, Adrien is a little, lost bird without a home. Marinette Dupain-Cheng takes him in, and they live as roommates together.</p><p>But not everything is okay. Adrien is a terrible roommate. They fight about everything and neither has any idea of their mutual pining for each other due to the lack of communication after the reveal and the battle.</p><p>Adrien is jealous of Marinette and Luka's very close friendship. </p><p>Eventually, enough is enough. Adrien decides that he'll do anything to fix his relationship with Marinette.</p><p>Starting by being a friend to her again.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir/Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug, Chloé Bourgeois/Luka Couffaine</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>61</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>August 2020 - Exchange</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>'til we can't tell where you end and where i begin</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladybuginette/gifts">ladybuginette</a>.</li>



    </ul></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Adrien didn’t know how things had gotten to this point. </p><p>All he wanted was to talk about his changing internet providers with his roommate in the living room. But somehow, the conversation had turned into a fight. A huge one. Like all the other conversations did lately, Adrien thought with a sigh. </p><p>He’d thought that living with his idol, Ladybug, would be a piece of cake. But apparently crushing on someone doesn’t automatically make them easy to live with.</p><p>After Chat and Ladybug had defeated Hawkmoth and put Gabriel Agreste in jail, the twenty-year-old Adrien had nowhere to go. Marinette, being his very good friend, had taken him in. Adrien had never lived with anyone--sans Plagg--before,  so Adrien didn’t know how to be a good roommate. </p><p>Which led to the beautiful, furious girl standing right before him. “I can’t believe you, Adrien Agreste,” she said, poking his chest. “How could you think that I wouldn’t care what internet provider we use? That’s a huge decision and I can’t believe you made it without me!”</p><p>Adrien stood his ground. “I thought AliceAdsL dot fr would be fine. You didn’t seem to care about what type of internet it was. You said, and I quote, ‘just get DSL or whatever.’”</p><p>Tikki and Plagg hovered over their respective holders’ shoulders, remaining silent. Tikki had long said that the two humans needed to work things out by themselves, even if Plagg tended to offer Adrien acerbic commentary afterwards.</p><p>Marinette seethed, clenching her tiny fists. Even in her anger, Adrien thought she was gorgeous. Were their relationship any better, he would have tried to make her flush for another reason, like a witty pun or something. </p><p>He loved her. Gosh, he loved her.</p><p>But she’d rejected Chat Noir countless times and he didn’t know what she thought about Adrien.</p><p>Probably nothing good, considering how often they fought.</p><p>“I told you that I preferred Orange dot com,” Marinette said, gritting her pretty, white teeth. “You didn’t <i>listen</i> to me, Adrien.”</p><p>“I don’t understand,” Adrien said, furrowing his brow. Their words were getting louder and louder, and he wanted to stop escalating, but he just couldn’t. Not when she was standing before him with clenched fists and flashing eyes. “You said you didn’t care! You just wanted some random--look, you know what? This is stupid.” </p><p>He pressed his fingers to the bridge of his nose. “What’s done is done and changing it would be a pain. Just accept that we have Alice as an internet provider.”</p><p>“No!” Marinette yelled, throwing her hands in the air. “The problem isn’t what internet provider we have, it’s that you didn’t even consult me when making the decision!”</p><p>“Next time we need an internet provider,” Adrien said dryly, “I totally will.”</p><p>Marinette glared at him, tipping her jaw up. “When you’re ready to apologize,” she said, in a dangerously even voice, “I’ll be in my room.”</p><p>She stormed across the hall, slamming the door shut behind her. Adrien scoffed. He didn’t know why she was acting like this. It wasn’t that big of a deal. Did it really matter that much to her what internet provider they had? They were practically all the same anyways.</p><p>He strode to the front door, eschewing a jacket, and jerked the door open. Stepping through, he slammed it behind him as hard as he could. Adrien could transform, but he didn’t want to. He wanted to roam.</p><p>The truth was, he was sick and tired of all the fighting. Once upon a time, he and Marinette were such good friends, and now they couldn’t even get through an evening without blowing up at each other. To Adrien, she was still that wonderful friend who would do anything for the people she cared about. But lately, they had been clashing so much that he wondered if she even cared about <i>him</i> anymore. </p><p>“Plagg,” Adrien whispered down to his pocket. “Does Marinette hate me?”</p><p>“Leave me out of this, Kid.” Plagg harrumphed. “I can’t tell what’s going on in either of your heads, and I don’t want to.”</p><p>Annoyed, Adrien let his kwami be.</p><p>He knew it must have been hard for her. To take him in after everything had happened, to be strong for him even when he could see she was in pain herself. So after everything she had done for him, why was he still hurting her? Adrien had never been one to enjoy arguments. </p><p>He could still vaguely remember the “discussions” his parents would have almost every night, when they thought he was sound asleep in his bed. But really, he’d stand at the foot of the staircase to hear everything. </p><p>His father and mother could never agree over anything - especially anything that concerned him. They would try their hardest to seem happy around Adrien - but he could see through Gabriel’s tired smiles and Emilie’s wistful eyes.</p><p>Adrien wouldn’t allow himself to think about his father any longer, but all Adrien knew was that he would do everything to make sure his relationship with Marinette never came to that.</p><p>Lost in his thoughts--none of which were about his father except for a few strays--Adrien wandered around for a while. Time ceased to have meaning in the dark, with street lamps pooling light on the street beneath them like puddles of liquid gold.</p><p>He strode through dried, fallen leaves, noticing with distaste that the bottom layer was wet and had soaked through his Converse and socks. His nose curled. The temperature was absolutely frigid in the fall season, and while he didn’t mind not having a jacket before, after meandering around in the streets, he was starting to regret his hasty exit from Marinette’s apartment. </p><p>Goosebumps sprouted on his bare arms and under his jeans. He looked at the buildings around him, trying to get his bearings so he could find his way back to the apartment--and found himself face to face with the Agreste mansion.</p><p>Memories flooded back to Adrien’s brain, striking him with such violence he almost felt sick to his stomach. He thought about his mother trapped in the basement and how Marinette had supported him through Emilie’s funeral. He thought about Nathalie’s remorse, and how she was rotting away in a prison cell because she’d refused to testify against Gabriel. He thought about Gabriel’s sneer when he was being taken away in the back of a police car, ending a reign of tyranny that had exhausted and harmed not only his son, but everyone in Paris.</p><p><i>My father was Hawkmoth,</i> was the primary thought, <i>and I was too blind to see it.</i> Like he’d done so often in the time immediately following his father’s arrest, Adrien cursed himself for his idiocy.</p><p>He’d lived with a supervillain for <i>years</i>. Years and years, and all that time Chat and Ladybug had struggled against Hawkmoth’s army. The final battle was terrible. Adrien was pretty sure he’d died, but Marinette wouldn’t talk about it. He only had straws to grasp at, fingers of memories that told him he’d lost quite a bit of time in the midst of the fight. </p><p>But Marinette had soldiered on. </p><p>Adrien’s gaze drifted to the bakery, just across the way from the horrible mansion. <i>Marinette was there for me,</i> he thought, swallowing around the sudden lump in his throat. Adrien remembered well the many nights he’d spent bawling his brains out all over Marinette’s shirt. He knew that she’d taken him in because she’d felt badly for him having to live in the place where his father had laid his head for so many years. <i>The whole time, she was there.</i></p><p>Adrien realized with a start that he hadn’t been there for her. He’d been an awful roommate, not a decent partner or companion. If they continued fighting… <i>I’ll lose her. Like I’ve lost everything else.</i></p><p>He dropped to his knees in the wet street, feeling the impact through his jeans as they were immediately soaked. Adrien’s heart slammed against his breastbone; he clutched his chest in an effort to get the beating to slow. He choked on his own tears. </p><p><i>Oh,</i> he thought, feeling overwhelmed with love for Marinette, his partner, his friend. <i>Marinette… I’m sorry.</i></p><p>Thunder cracked overhead. The rain started lightly at first, so lightly that Adrien barely noticed it. Then, without warning, the heavens let loose with a mighty downpour. </p><p><i>A fitting punishment,</i> Adrien thought ruefully, a smile twisting his lips as he stared up into the rain, fat droplets bouncing off his eyelashes. <i>But if I catch my death out here, I’ll never get to apologize.</i></p><p>He stood shakily, feeling the burn in his knees from hitting the asphalt. </p><p>Bathed in rain, heartsore but determined to set things right, Adrien ran.</p>
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